A Breakthrough for Science — and Young Japanese Women

Japan’s national institute Riken researcher Haruko Obokata works at her laboratory in Kobe, western Japan, on Jan. 28.

The 30-year-old Japanese researcher who led a scientific discovery of potentially Nobel proportions has caused a media storm in her home country. Everyone wants to know: who exactly is the young woman behind the pipette?

The young researcher – who wears an apron instead of a lab coat – immediately stood out not only for her work, but her sense of style. Local press hailed her as an icon for other up and coming ‘rikejo’ or ‘science girls,’ a possible breakthrough role model in a field dominated in Japan by older men.

Local media interviewed acquaintances and teachers of Ms. Obokata, who remembered her devotion to research, but also to maintaining a life outside her studies. In college, she played lacrosse.

Her lab, located in the western city of Kobe, has pink doors, pink timers and pink trashcans. The yellow walls are decorated with stickers of imaginary creatures from the Finnish series for children ‘The Moomins,’ also popular in Japan.

It was in this lab at the Riken Center for Developmental Biology that Ms. Obokata and her international team helped figure out the cheapest and quickest way to date to create stem cells simply by putting mature cells in a mild acid solution.

Stem cells are unspecified cells that can produce any of the other specific cells in the body, such as blood or thyroid gland cells.

If the group’s research on mouse cells is applicable to humans, it could pave the way for work on organ regeneration and treating blindness and diabetes.

Television personality Tomoaki Ogura introduced the discovery to viewers by saying, “A very cute apron-wearing girl has just announced amazing research that could repaint the history of the life sciences.”

Ms. Obokata isn’t the first Japanese scientist to win global attention for advancing the science of stem cell research. In 2012, Shinya Yamanaka shared the Nobel Prize with a British researcher for figuring out how to return mature human cells to stem cells. Mr. Yamanaka, was considered unusually young for a prominent Japanese scientist for capturing the prize at the age of 50 — a good 20 years older than Ms. Obokata. Mr. Yamanaka told Japanese papers on the release of Ms. Obokata’s research: “I’m so proud that this important result was issued by a Japanese researcher. I hope they can replicate this with the same methods on human cells going forward.”

Yet the flood of media attention on the ‘extracurricular’ parts of Ms. Obokata’s career quickly became a source of distress for her. On Friday, two days after the team’s paper was published, she issued a plea for privacy.

“Since the press conference about the research results, reports that have nothing to do with the research have run wild, such that it is a hindrance to my research activities,” she said. “Every day is very painful for me.”

It’s not surprising that Ms. Obokata simply wants the public to focus on her scientific achievements, after years of setbacks. Other experts were initially skeptical. Nature rejected the team’s paper when it was first submitted in April 2012.

“They responded to me that the paper made a mockery of the 100 years of cell biology,” she told reporters. “There were countless times I cried all night.”

Comments (4 of 4)

And... now she's found to have faked her research. It's a good thing everyone was worried about offenses against her gender instead of offenses against science!

6:23 am February 7, 2014

Denise wrote:

Jesus, she makes a ground breaking discovery that's going to take stem cell research to whole new heights and this article devotes paragraphs upon paragraphs dedicated to her appearance and literally anything other than her background and her discovery.
Also ditto to Lilly's point, she should be properly titled after her profession and status rather than the Ms that waters down a good amount of her position of intellect and the gravity of her position.
It's 2014 and people still can't figure out how to write an article about a professional woman that's set a game changer on the table, be it in the medicine sector or any other.

3:25 pm February 6, 2014

Lilly wrote:

Why is she "Ms" Obokata. This seems disrespectful and misogynistic to insist on putting a gender-related title instead of either her proper professional title (Dr or Professor) or just nothing...

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